Only Human
by The Prettiest Frog in the Pond
Summary: To err is human... A series of oneshots and drabbles based on Edward Elric's greatest mistake- stepping onto holy ground where mortals are forbidden, and attempting to bring back what is dead. Brotherly fluff, angst.
1. Resurrection

_I own nothing. Originally this was just one short story/oneshot, but I've decided to put all oneshots and drabbles relating to Ed and Al's human transmutation here. They are separate stories, but all around the same central theme.  
_

_**Thirty-five litres of water**_

"How're we gonna live without her, brother?"

Edward looked back to him, golden eyes harsh and determined. "We're not, Al," he said firmly, "We're going to bring her back."

_**Twenty-five kilograms of carbon**_

"Brother, nobody's ever done this before... are you sure-?"

Ed scowled. "Of course I'm sure. We can do this Al... What else have we got to lose?"

_**Four litres of ammonia**_

"Okay, Al: Respiratory system."

"...Breathing, right?"

Ed nodded. "Immune system."

"That fights off illnesses, doesn't it?"

"Yes. Digestive system..."

_**One-point-five kilograms of lime**_

"Right... and we need to make allowance for energy transfer, so we need an arc here..."

Al leaned over, pencil in hand, pointing towards a symbol in the outer part of their quickly-sketched transmutation circle. "Shouldn't that be an equilateral triangle instead of an isosceles?"

"Of course! That makes sense..."

_**Eight-hundred grams of phosphorus**_

"Haemoglobin."

"That's in red blood cells, right? To transport oxygen?"

"Yeah. Okay, uh... Alveoli."

"...In the lungs?"

"Right. Okay, so-"

_**Two-hundred and fifty grams of salt**_

"What's missing? Every attempt so far has failed, but why?"

Ed bit his lip, thinking. "I don't know, Al... something's got to be missing..."

_**One-hundred grams of saltpetre**_

"Brother, are you sure we should be learning this? It's got to be forbidden fro a reason..."

"Come on, Al... we've got to try... to see Mom again. To see her smile."

_**Eighty grams of sulphur**_

"Okay, Al, don't worry. It's all ready."

"Brother, what if it goes wrong?"

"It won't, Al. Everything's perfect."

_**Seven-point-five grams of fluorine**_

"Our blood, from her blood... That's a soul, really."

_**Five grams of iron**_

"It's working!"

_**Three grams of silicon**_

"A rebound...! no, no, no... Al? Al? ALPHONSE! Give him back! _He's my only brother, he's all I have left, GIVE HIM BACK!_"

_**And trace amounts of fifteen other elements**_

"I'm sorry, Al..."

_**That is the complete chemical makeup of the average adult human being**_

"Al, Al, I'm so sorry..."

"Ed? Ed- your arm- your leg- Ed, _what have you done?!"_

_**Down to the last specks of protein in your eyelashes**_

"I didn't have much time... I used my arm as material in a transmutation, Al. I bound your soul to that armour..."

_**But there's still something missing**_

"Please, help him! He's gonna bleed to death!"

"Al? Is that you?"

_**Something we can't explain**_

"You tried to bring back your mother, didn't you?"

_**There is nothing you can give**_

"Take it as payment... for automail. I'm going to make this right again."

_**In exchange for a human soul.**_

_"Al, I promise... I'm going to make this right."_


	2. Desperate

_Very short (Very, very short.) Ed's point of view. I don't own anything._

* * *

We did what we did because we were desperate. We were two young kids, almost completely alone in the world, with no family. Two bright kids, prodigies, geniuses and _we knew it_.

That was what clinched it, in the end. We knew we were bright- and we thought that because of that we could do what no one else had ever done.

We thought we could bring back the dead. We were wrong.

I did what I did because I was desperate. I was ten years old, without a mother, without a father, and with my own little brother being devoured by the Gate before my very eyes. I didn't think- I just acted.

Looking back, I wonder how I managed it. I'd just lost a leg, just seen my brother die, been to the goddamned Gate of Truth and just seen the... the _thing_, that awful pulsating pile of flesh and bones that should have been my mother. How the hell was I lucid enough to draw those arrays? I didn't even have to work them out- a side effect of the Gate, I suppose- I just knew, then and there, exactly what circle I would require to bring my little brother back to this world.

I was bleeding heavily from my stump of a limb. Blood was readily available, all I had to do was topple that old suit of armour, dip my finger into the pool of _my own blood_ and draw out those arrays- one in the armour, on each of my arms, one over my heart. And I offered everything I had for my little brother's soul.

It took my arm and dropped me in a heap to the floor. All I can remember thinking is _what have I done?_ After all, it was my idea. Al would never have done it if I hadn't pushed him into it.

I did what I did because I was desperate. And now, we're both paying for it.


	3. Daedalus and Icarus

_Hi there. You guys remember all the way back in episode one of FMA? Well, maybe not, but there's a quote there: _

_"You're not a god."_

_"And neither is the sun. It's just a mass of hydrogen. Get close to it like Cornello claims, and all you'll do is burn up." _

_There's something similar in the manga too, but damn if I can remember what it was. Anyway, here is my oneshot based almost entirely on the story Edward is referring to, that of Daedalus and Icarus. If you've read it, great, if not, well, you're about to. _

_A little comparison between Daedalus/Icarus and Edward/Alphonse. Finally: I know that the quote at the end is wrong. It's supposed to be.  
_

_Disclaimer: Ha. Yeah. I wish._

* * *

_There is a story..._

There is a tale...

_There were two brothers, alone in the world._

There was a man and his son, trapped in the labyrinth by a cruel king.

_And the elder brother took books and chalk and chemicals, and from them he crafted a transmutation circle. He bade his brother to aid him, and together they prepared to take flight and fly away to the very gates of heaven to their mother- and despite the younger brother's fears, they continued:_

And the man took wax and wire and feathers, and from them he crafted two beautiful sets of wings. He gave one to his son and took the other for himself, and together they prepared to take flight and fly away across the sea to their freedom- but before they left, the man cautioned his son:

"_Brother, are you sure we should be doing this?"_

"Do not fly too close to the sun, for you will burn up and the wax will melt, and then your wings will break apart and you will fall into the sea."

_But the elder brother calmed him and the two took flight, soaring high into the heavens. The elder brother, face lit with alchemic light, pushed every last drop of energy into the array._

And the two took flight, soaring high into the sky. The son found the sensation of flight exhilarating, and as time passed, he began to get a little more adventurous.

_In the center of the circle, something took shape, and the brothers went closer and closer to the heavens._

The son flew a little higher than his father.

"_Just a little more..._" _the elder brother murmured._

"Be careful." cautioned the man.

_A smile lit his face. They would succeed, they would see their mother's face once more!_

The son laughed. "Relax!" he called back. "I'm fine, see, they're not melting yet."

_The heavens came closer and closer._

The son flew a little higher.

_Just a little more...!_

"Be careful!" the father chastised angrily.

_Just a little closer..._

The son laughed. "I'm fine!"

_For a split second, the elder brother could see his mother's face._

And they flew on. But then the son flew a little higher.

_They came closer, ever closer, and the danger grew ever greater; the warnings they had read went unheeded._

The father shouted to his son, but the wind snatched away his words and they went unheard. The son flew higher again, and again, and again, his father's warnings unheeded.

_If the elder brother noticed the black tendrils of the gate wrapping around him or his brother, he did not stop. He could not stop, not anymore; closer, closer, closer he came._

If the son noticed the warmth of melted wax as it dripped onto his back, or the sensation of a falling feather as it brushed against his skin, or even the warmth of the sun beating unmercifully on his back; he did not fly any lower. Instead, he went higher, ever higher, closer and closer to the sun above him.

_The elder brother's leg began to disappear into the gate._

The wax melted. One by one, the feathers came free, spiralling through the air and whipped away by the wind. The father cried out to his son, but to no avail: he could not hear.

_The younger brother, bound in black ropes, was dragged away._

Another feather came free of the wings, and the son found that it was suddenly not so easy to fly as it had been. His father's warning rang in his ears- but it was too late. Feathers flew free of the wax faster and faster as he spiralled out of control with a panicked shout.

_The younger was devoured by the gate's gaping maw as he cried out for his brother, who leapt for him with an anguished cry._

Finally the wings gave way, and the son dropped through the air, his father flying towards the falling boy with an anguished cry- too late, far too late.

_And then the younger brother was gone, and for the first time in his life, the elder was completely alone in the world._

He fell like a stone to the dark waters below, and the father was alone in the sky.

"_ALPHONSE!"_

"ICARUS!"

"_No, no, he's my brother, my only brother! Give him BACK!_"

"No! My son, my son!"

_The elder brother toppled a suit of armour and in his own blood sketched a seal to bring his brother back from the very gates of hell._

The man dived into the sea after his son.

_The soul he dragged back, in return for his arm, but the body he lost to the gaping jaws of truth._

The body he dragged back, broken and adrift, but the soul he lost to the gaping jaws of Hades.

_Fly too close to the sun, and all you'll do is burn up-_

And that is the one, and only, truth.


	4. Mercy

_Disclaimer: I own nothing._

_

* * *

_

Truth, contrary to popular belief, did in fact understand the concept of mercy_._ Truth, by definition, understood _everything_.

Truth _understood_ mercy. It just did not feel the need to be _merciful_.

There are laws. Laws should not be broken. People who break laws should be punished. There is no room for mercy.

And yet...

There had been occasions when it had tried to be merciful.

* * *

It took its payment from the younger boy, and from the elder it took a leg as passage fee before shoving him into the Gate. Truth gave him its knowledge and then it let him go, missing a leg and a brother, but alive.

The punishment had been meted. The agreement every alchemist makes- every time they draw a circle, every time they activate an array- the agreement to follow equivalent exchange had been honoured by the boy's death. It was over.

Or at least, it should have been.

Truth felt the elder boy's mind reach out towards the Gate. It felt the crackle of alchemy.

"_He's my brother- give him back!"_

Truth knew the laws.

_In exchange for his brother's soul... his own. That is equivalent. _

It knew the laws. But for some reason...

It hesitated.

_It is equivalent. Take the soul._

Truth could feel the boy's desperation, as it always could. When an alchemist came to the Gate, the alchemist became part of it, and Truth could feel their minds- their anger, pain, hate, sadness, fear...

_He is very young._

_He is very afraid._

_He is very... alone._

The arms of the Gate reached out.

_People are often more merciful to children._

Many humans had passed through the Gate. Perhaps humanity had rubbed off on it.

_But there __**must **__be equivalence..._

It took the boy's arm in exchange for his brother's soul.

_Equivalence enough, I think._

Truth closed the Gate. Thousands of purple eyes stared unblinkingly at him from the darkness, thousands of fanged mouths grinned knowingly.

_Mercy, _Truth told them. And that was that.


	5. Punishment Enough

_Oh, fanfiction dot net. It's been far too long._

_100 words on the penalty for human transmutation. Probably not my best work, but hey, I like it. Review, please; I need some incentive to work on my incomplete fics._

* * *

Human transmutation is forbidden, on pain of death- but Edward feels that this is unnecessary.

All other crimes involve taking something- somebody's belongings, somebody's life, somebody's dignity- but the purpose of human transmutation is to give. Is it really so wrong to try and return life to the dead?

Your intentions are good, even if the outcome is tragic.

Losing somebody you love is hard- surely it's understandable that you would try anything- _anything-_ to get them back?

But even if it _is_ wrong, he doesn't think that it merits execution, or even a jail sentence-

Failure is punishment enough.


End file.
